Dont use Heal...ever, with train of thought its the same HPM as Greater Heal.
Use Inner Will.
Also, haste isn't good(it affects your shields in no way), especially if your going oom, ignore these people, if mana is a problem go spirit, otherwise alot of crit and mastery(they compliment each other).

Try to not let DA from PoH go unwasted.

Disc isn't a good heal them up spec, its preventitive in nature via shields and damage reductions, so you will have alot harder time healing up then other healers but your party's EHP is much higher with you healing.

R you trolling? Heal is the best mana/heal spell thers is and it reduces the cd of weakened soul. Atm haste is god for disc. Inner will? seriusly... use inner fire the bonus sp is way better that a small mana reduction on 1 spell (PW:S). If you r clueless dont post pls...

Please read the rules. Do not call other users trolls, thanks! ~ Ultima

Last edited by Ultima; 2011-09-13 at 03:04 AM.
Reason: User was infracted for this post.

R you trolling? Heal is the best mana/heal spell thers is and it reduces the cd of weakened soul. Atm haste is god for disc. Inner will? seriusly... use inner fire the bonus sp is way better that a small mana reduction on 1 spell (PW:S). If you r clueless dont post pls...

Are you a troll? you can do the same HPM as heal with Smite healing(which reduces Penance CD, FYI) and it does damage to the enemy and it gives you a 15% healing boost CD.
Haste is not god, a combination of all stats is best but drop haste while gearing so you dont go oom as fast.

Inner Will, yes, 15% less mana cost on your most important spell (PW:S) + on Renew(4th best HPM spell with BT up, and excelent HPC/T) + Prayer of Mending(Which should be used every CD). He said he had mana problems, use Will unless you are ending fights with 30%+ Mana then go Fire.
Did you not read his post saying mana was a problem?

Edit- I mean, the thread title says "Going OOM as Disc" and your telling him how to use more mana!

you can spam heal from now and till the end of time and never go oom and you tell him not to use it? lols
An renew? the worst spell as disc, only in hight gear lvl's is it worth casting and even there its still shit

you can spam heal from now and till the end of time and never go oom and you tell him not to use it? lols
An renew? the worst spell as disc, only in hight gear lvl's is it worth casting and even there its still shit

You can also spam smite till the end of time and do the same healing and do damage and get a healing boost cd.... you fail.
Also for the 5x you used heal, he could have used 1x Gheal for the same HPM, again you fail.
Renew HPC/T under BT is better then Gheal HPS with higher HPM under innerwill, just because its not rejuvenation doesn't mean its bad, again, you fail.

So not only does Smite damage the enemy making the encounter faster and hence, less healing, it provides Evangelism at 5 stacks gives 5% mana back(Roughly the excess cost of it compared to Heal, more so at higher gear) and 15% healing boost, it also enhance Penance to an insane HPM level.

I'd still go for haste or mastery. More haste means more Heals (the Heal heal, the mana efficient one) and more mastery means more damage absorbed from the spells that do crit. You get 10% crit on weakened soul targets and an additional 25% chance each time you use Inner Focus (by the way, make sure you use IF every time it's available, free Greater Heals are tasty). YMMV, of course, but I think in the long run crit is just weak.

Are you tracking your Rapture procs for mana regen? While you don't quite have enough mana to be mana positive while casting shield, triggering Rapture every time it's off cooldown will save you quite a bit. I know it made a huge difference for me when I was learning Disc. I use TellMeWhen - Curse.

Lol. Part of the reason I hate to visit priest forums right here. Don't reforge particularly for haste/mastery. While he points out that more haste means more healing, it's also MORE MANA that is being eaten up, and it seems the concept of such a thing is lost on most people. Balance your secondary stats, crit=haste=mastery. Please drop Strength of Soul, because it's just a bad talent in general and pick up Archangel/evangelism and atonement. I know people say "atonement's for raid healing," but it really isn't. I use it even when healing main tanks in raids. PoM on cooldown, only shield when rapture is up, and keep evangelism at a five stack for the healing buff when you need it.

More haste doesn't mean more mana usage unless you use said haste to spam the hell out of your spells until you are oom. Haste in reality allows you to cast a heal slightly quicker then you would have otherwise, I never got the whole HPM thing I thought our jobs where to keep people alive not to spam the healing meters with random numbers and go oom in the process.

I do agree with AA spec for 5 mans though the extra dps you are doing helps bosses drop faster and the healing it's self will usually end up on players most of the time plus you get a nifty cooldown of plus healing if needed, raiding with atonement build is a little iffy though as it tends to heal any random friendly npc in the area.

In raids I use the heal spell quite a bit but it's mainly for small damage or for spamming on tanks just to keep them topped off when damage is light, 5 mans on the other hand tend to have more spiky damage so dependent on the tank you either can use it or you can't.

It seems like if the whole party gets under 50% health I have a hard time getting them back up to full health without going oom. This is an alt so I have a lot to learn but im not completely unschooled in the spec. The main healing spells im using are Power Word: Shield, Penance and Greater Heal. Any advice?

if whole party goes low, use prayer of healing.
drink between pulls. dont spam shields, avoid flash heal.
use 'heal' (sometimes dps gets hit occasionally, you dont need to get them to 100% in a second).
dont feel like you need to heal up dpsers asap.

discipline is very gear-dependand, trust me, it will all get easier and more fun once you get better gear

Dont use Heal...ever, with train of thought its the same HPM as Greater Heal.
Use Inner Will.
Also, haste isn't good(it affects your shields in no way), especially if your going oom, ignore these people, if mana is a problem go spirit, otherwise alot of crit and mastery(they compliment each other).

Try to not let DA from PoH go unwasted.

Disc isn't a good heal them up spec, its preventitive in nature via shields and damage reductions, so you will have alot harder time healing up then other healers but your party's EHP is much higher with you healing.

If you want to use heal it doesn't hurt you but pre casting a Gheal when you know a big hit is going to come is better ofc and having a lot of haste means you can "heal them up" faster when needed and cancel casts and stand around when you don't. (ie: tank dodge parry deathstrike) Spirit isn't something you can only get at the cost of everything else you can have 2700 spirit a set bonus 2 regen trinkets and still have 17% haste 15% crit and 35% mastery.

If you stack up a high divine aegis ofc you don't want to let it drop off a 57k absorb so you PoH to keep it up but if you have a 3k absorb don't worry about it

The only healer that has a higher max throughput peak is Resto Druids with hots rolling while channeling tranquility with procs or possibly a shaman in 25 man with healing rain(broken doesn't split past 6 people anymore) spamming chain heal. Holy priests can do more burst but less sustained than a shaman or disc priest and disc can sustain it longer than shaman and its not a 25 man only capability. Point being, pretty sure 35-40k peak hps on beth and domo kinda smashes your "Disc isn't a good heal them up spec" comment to oblivion

I'm just going to chime in here for a bit to address a few of the OP's issues. A big part of playing a disc priest is the proper use of active cooldowns and buffs. These can greatly increase your mana efficiency. Here is an example:

The group is beginning to take a lot of damage and health is approaching 50%. Tank is also taking a big hit soon, what do you do?

Pop PW:S onto the tank, this gives you the buff Borrowed Time, reducing your prayer of healing cast time. It also buffers the tank damage. Cast Prayer of healing x2 to get the group back up, this also procs a DA shield on everyone in the group which mitigates incoming damage allowing you to get their healths up. By then the tank's PW:S has been used up and you can begin healing the tank again. Furthermore by your PW:S being consumed by damage you also gain Rapture which restores 7% of your mana in the process.

Make sure you are using Inner Focus on every cooldown. It amounts to a FREE heal every 45 seconds. If you are not using it at every available cooldown you are throwing your mana away.

Do not be afraid to pop Power Infusion on trash pulls and at the beginning of a boss fight. PI is on a short 2m cooldown so you can use it sometimes 2x during a boss fight or every other trash pull even. This amounts to more saved mana.

Use an addon like power auras to keep track of Rapture so you can keep getting a proc every 12 seconds. That essentially is 7% mana back every 12 seconds, minus the cost of the shield. That still is extra mana that you didn't have before, and a 20-30k damage mitigation at the same time.

When all else fails Divine Hymn!

Being aware of your mana back abilities and using your cooldowns freely can greatly increase your mana efficiency, far more than simple spec and gear changes.

As for this whole Haste vs Crit debate. It boils down to this. Haste gives you more throughput allowing you to heal more, but you will consume more mana in the process. In a 5m environment this isn't that big of a deal but in a raid it can hurt you depending on your raid composition. Crit is more mana efficient healing in that it provides a 7-10k free shield every time you do a crit heal. Due to DA procs you can get more efficient healing via crit than haste, but at the expense of raw throughput. I personally focus more on crit these days for raid healing. DA and PW:S amount for 40-50% of my overall healing so anything that maximizes that is to my benefit.

On some fights like Domo Normal I would cast prayer of healing on the raid groups to proc a DA shield on everyone in the raid. The reasoning is like this, for the same cost of a single PW:S that mitigates 20-30k damage I can proc 5 shields on ppl that mitigate 35-50k total damage. It simply is more efficient. (Note: Yes I know on heroic this isn't a viable option as you normally don't stack but I am just using this as an example or how one thinks in terms of efficient healing.)

The simple solution to the OP's quandary is the lack of PoH as a mentioned spell used.

Remember, he said he mainly uses PW:S, Penance, & GH and he has trouble w/ the whole party dipping below 50% AND running out of mana. This seems like PW:S on WS CD, Penance on CD, GH if else. That would result in fast OOMage at lower gear levels and poor spell selection for the trouble damage pattern.

The OP simply needs to give the PoH button more love and he'll be fine.

And a stats talk for a "just getting into H-5man" question? Really? Come on, man.

On some fights like Domo Normal I would cast prayer of healing on the raid groups to proc a DA shield on everyone in the raid. The reasoning is like this, for the same cost of a single PW:S that mitigates 20-30k damage I can proc 5 shields on ppl that mitigate 35-50k total damage. It simply is more efficient. (Note: Yes I know on heroic this isn't a viable option as you normally don't stack but I am just using this as an example or how one thinks in terms of efficient healing.)

While I agree DA is good to stack up pre fight or when the PoH will heal people not just for the absorb I'm not sure what gave you 35-50k. A non crit PoH for me is between 3-4k shield on each person and a crit is ofc double that. Unless you are relying on it being critical on all 5 people...idk anyway my point is a few PW:S is better if the healing part of PoH is not going to matter even in inner will

But as an aside absorbing the whole first scythe on domo the whole stomp on rhyolith the burst fire aoe on alysrazor and on bethtilac = fun

Don't use the shield on everyone right away, tank and melee dps, especially if the dps is known to take threat and damage. Prayer of Mending on the tank. Also use Renew.

Now periods of low damage use heal, thats right heal on the tank at least once to lower the weakened soul debuff on the tank, if there is a lot of incoming damage do two and reapply PW:S right away, doing so with heal is a minimal cost to keep a 100% uptime of the shield on your tank. And if damage gets high change that Heal to Greater Heal. Also use Penance where applicable and Flash Heal when it is on CD for your "save my ass" healing.

I like to use Inner Focus and cast a Prayer of Healing, especially if aoe damage starts, Divine Aegis is very helpful, and your mastery affects it.

As for gear, Don't forge to crit, Forge to mastery or spirit followed by haste.

Thats just my suggestions. Everyone is going to say that everyone else is wrong and they are right. This is what works for me. Don't be afraid to experiment and use any tools you have available to use to get the job done. Blizzard has changed healing in a way that critical thinking and being able to heal efficiently is important you so don't OOM. If you have the chance during those instances don't struggle to heal stupid. Yank their ass out of the fire once with Leap of Faith as benefit of the doubt, but thats it or you will OOM healing and they will die anyway. As many have said watch your overhealing, it is a waste of mana. Be conservative and efficent and it will get you through.

Last edited by Chowderman; 2011-09-12 at 05:04 PM.

"I heard Shadowmourne procs naked ladies..."
The rapture took my paladin - May 21, 2011
In a recent online survey, 100% of the population uses the internet.

For Mana regen a bit of it comes from getting better gear. You should pick up the Molten front Neck for sure. You could also try enchanting that wonderful staff you have, Personally I prefer Power Torrent I'd go for Heartsong for you right now. The other major component to mana issues is spelll usage. How often are you using PoM? Do you flail spam flash heal when someone takes a damage spike? Are you using PW:S too much? (I'll give you a hint its probably this) You can generally get away with never casting this on a non-tank.

As for #2 this is most likely group fail. I can think of only a small number of un-avoidable AoE damage in 5 mains. Things like Anhuurs Hymn or Steel breaker when he gets dipped in the lava. If people are dying in under a 2 GCD then its their fault(in most cases even for the tank). Try picking up a better mana regen trinket. I love tear of blood or Blood of Isiset which gives great mana regen you don't have to think about.

While I agree DA is good to stack up pre fight or when the PoH will heal people not just for the absorb I'm not sure what gave you 35-50k. A non crit PoH for me is between 3-4k shield on each person and a crit is ofc double that. Unless you are relying on it being critical on all 5 people...idk anyway my point is a few PW:S is better if the healing part of PoH is not going to matter even in inner will

But as an aside absorbing the whole first scythe on domo the whole stomp on rhyolith the burst fire aoe on alysrazor and on bethtilac = fun

Mine prob gets that high cause I pop Inner Focus just as I cast the first one (efficient use of cooldowns imo), that gets me a 10-11k shield off the bat. Then every other one I normally cast 2 PoH per group to get their healths back up. So the heal is doing double duty in healing ppl up and popping a DA shield on everyone. The DA proc does stack you know, and it's not like the raid is taking any additional damage between Flame Scythes, so the shield builds up.

Since I use power Auras to keep track of everything else it was a simple matter of adding a profile to track time between Rapture procs. This is what I use.

Mine prob gets that high cause I pop Inner Focus just as I cast the first one (efficient use of cooldowns imo), that gets me a 10-11k shield off the bat. Then every other one I normally cast 2 PoH per group to get their healths back up. So the heal is doing double duty in healing ppl up and popping a DA shield on everyone. The DA proc does stack you know, and it's not like the raid is taking any additional damage between Flame Scythes, so the shield builds up.

Since I use power Auras to keep track of everything else it was a simple matter of adding a profile to track time between Rapture procs. This is what I use.

Inner focus or not you aren't going to get a 35-50k shield off of one PoH which is what you seem to be saying, even 11k(on one person) would mean you had to have a crit of over 30k and that just doesn't happen. I'm well aware it stacks up if you noticed I mentioned several times about it, but if you aren't getting at least 3 non overheals from that PoH then its a waste of mana and you should instead be using PW:S. Usually for domo I PoH each group 1-2 times (with at least one precast) after the scythe at the pull(if you're stacking up DA here its wasted mana that would be more effectively used on PW:S or saved for later) and then every scythe phase after that people dip low enough that it takes more time to get them stabilized so you can stack it up higher without wasting mana in that case. Shielding people whose seed is about to go off and anyone under 80% health up to 3-5 shields per scythe with a shield in between every cast for borrowed time.

This is going way out of the range of what the OP was needing to know but I cant stand thinking hes going to read something and take it for 100% truth and be doing it wrong. Its very simple add healing done by PoH(not overhealing) and the shields you get on all 5 people together, is it more than your PW:S goes for in inner will? inner fire? compare. done.

Im just getting into 5-man Heroics and im having mana issues when it comes to taking severe raid damage as Discipline. It seems like if the whole party gets under 50% health I have a hard time getting them back up to full health without going oom. This is an alt so I have a lot to learn but im not completely unschooled in the spec. The main healing spells im using are Power Word: Shield, Penance and Greater Heal. Any advice?

Macro Inner Focus to GHeal, FHeal and PoH. Inner Focus doesn't trigger the GCD, so you can ensure you're using it every time it's available. ToT builds benefit greatly from this since it brings the efficiency of GHeal very near the levels of Heal.

Try not to use PW:S with Inner Fire up unless you need the extra absorption. In 5 mans you usually won't. PW:S can (and should) be used with Inner Will if you plan on spamming your shields on multiple targets for incoming damage spikes, ala Valiona's breath weapon in HGB. Also remember that PW:S procs borrowed time, which allows you to get 2-3 instant casts (yay extra renew ticks!) out at close to a 1.0s GCD before starting a casted heal that will also benefit from the haste. This can let you get a lot of healing out in a short time. (try this: PW:S 1st low health target -> PoH -> PW:S 2nd low health target -> PoH, etc)

When the group is low on health don't hesitate to Pain Suppression your tank to allow you some breathing room to cast mana efficient heals on people that need healing.

I still use a Rapture timer so I get Rapture procs on cooldown.

I also don't bother with Strength of Soul because it seems like a talent designed solely for when I'm assigned to pure tank healing duties or when I know there are silence/interrupt effects in an encounter. The rest of the time it's a waste of talent points. I'd rather have 3/3 Inner Sanctum so I take 6% less damage, or can move 6% faster to get out of things. (this is just my opinion, not anything I've mathed out)

Use Power Infusion when there is big incoming damage for both the haste boost and the mana savings.

Don't re-cast PoM before all 5 charges are used unless you have no other options and have glyphed for 60% extra healing.

If someone tells you to "use inner will" or "use inner fire" exclusively, don't listen to them. They're not maximizing their priest at all. Maybe it's the long-time warrior player in me, but some encounters see me stance dancing these two like it's going out of style. They both have benefits and drawbacks. Use your whole toolbox, and use it now. There's no reason to get into bad habits like staying in a single "inner" stance for an entire encounter.

Lastly, don't forget about Hymn of Hope and Shadowfiend. Either is great on its own, but together they're money in the bank.

GL!

P.s. A lot of this will change when you get into raiding because there are healing assignments. It'll serve you well in 5 man content though.